to gather herbs for my elixirs.

Gin.

Oh, it's my pleasure.

I love coming out to the meadow.

Getting to see all the different creatures and plants interacting.

It's like a bustling, natural metropolis of biodiversity.

Indeed.

I find it helps me gain perspective.

Just observing the way life sort itself out and everything filling a different functional niche, as it were.

Yeah, even down to the things people might consider undesirable, like weeds or pests or pathogens.

Each one actually has a purpose and value.

So true.

So.

Oh, I almost touch your boss bonnet, but you're just a little beetle, aren't you?

Clever playing imposter like that.

Mega Celine Robin here.

The locust borer.

Is that so?

Well done Gene.

And how does it go about boring into black locusts, I presume?

Do you know Gene?

Gene?

What?

How does it bore into black locust trees?

What?

The mega Celine row beneath a. Yeah, there's a robinia here.

No, I mean the boring beetle.

Well, I don't think they're boring.

What?

I think they're beautiful.

What's that weird looking growth on it, though?

Hey, do you have any idea what this is meant for Gwen?

filangus robinia with cracked cap Polly poor Pour.

I'm not even sure what that means.

Polly pores are a type of fungi, and this one is a parasite to the black locust.

Well, that's too bad.

Too bad.

For whom?

The tree.

But where is the tree?

It's in the meadow.

And what is the meadow?

An ecosystem.

And so what happens in an ecosystem when a legume plant that's part of it dies.

The bulk of its nitrogen becomes available to the surrounding plants.

Affirmative.

So the black locust dying actually benefits the entire meadow.

Oh my god.

Oh no.

Hello.

Hi.

Were you the one talking to me this whole time?

Yeah.

I'm the steward of this meadow.

I'm sorry I scared you.

Oh, That's okay.

I'm gene.

Sorry about your, sirup.

My last bit of black locust, honey.

Actually, it's my favorite.

Is everything all right, Gene?

I heard it.

Oh, I didn't know this meadow had a steward.

Do Meadows usually have a steward?

Well, I wouldn't say it's uncommon for them to rather elusive folk, wouldn't you say?

That's fair.

Oh.

So our stewards, Are you magical?

Yeah.

We're magic adjacent.

Stewards.

Observe intent, nature.

Optimize it, if you will, but through natural means, not conventional magic.

Oh.

That's cool.

We think so.

So, I'm sorry I never got your name.

Steward.

But I know your name.

Stewart with a t o Stewart.

Correct.

So you're Stewart, the steward?

I am, that's kind of funny.

How so?

Oh, because, you know, it's, It's not.

Well, Stewart the steward.

I gather it was you who identified the locust borer for me.

It was.

Right.

So why is it called the locust borer?

If I only saw them on that plant with the yellow flowers.

I thought locust borers feed on pollen from the various species in the genus Sola D'Argo, commonly known as the golden rods.

But they lay their eggs on the bark of the black locust, which actually has a direct relationship to the cracked cap polyp.

Or you were wondering about Gene.

Really?

Indeed.

It's called interdependence.

The dependency of two or more species on one another for survival.

Is that sort of like mutualism?

By.

Yes.

Mutualism and interdependence are what bind the natural world together.

No group or individual exists in a vacuum.

It can be hard to recognize at first, but when we learn to look at things in other way, we realize that everything is connected somehow or other.